12 Chemistry

The Year 12 Chemistry course relates to Level 7 of The Material World strand of the New Zealand Curriculum. This course is designed to follow on from the Year 11 Chemistry course.

Chemistry is about understanding the properties of different substances and how these substances can change.  Chemistry allows us to predict how substances may alter when the surrounding conditions change, or how they may react to form new substances, and to explain why this happens. Chemists are continually changing matter into new and more useful forms.

Chemistry goes on continuously, all around us; in plants that make food and in animals that digest this food, in the burning of fuels and corrosion of metals, in the formation of snow and ice, in industries that supply us with all our household products, and in the many biological processes that maintain the living world.

Chemists use their understanding of atoms, molecules and ions to explain and predict the properties and behaviour of different materials.

Course Achievement Objectives

The objectives of the Year 12 chemistry course are to enable students to:

• investigate and describe production, properties and uses of substances
• understand and use chemistry concepts and patterns to explain properties of matter
• obtain, interpret and use a range of chemical information
• gain practical skills in handling substances and manipulating equipment safely.

Content
Quantitative Chemistry, Organic Substances, Chemical Reactivity (Reaction Rates, Equilibrium, Acids and Bases), Bonding, Structure, Properties and Energy Changes of Substances, Oxidation and Reduction Reactions.